Analysis of current economic conditions and policy

Wisconsin’s Governor Walker Touts Alternate Employment Series

Makes little impact on trend relative to promise, and relative to the Nation

Governor Walker’s administration has in the past criticized the BLS series for state nonfarm employment, and has relied upon the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) series (which lags in reporting by several months). The QCEW is more accurate, as it’s a census (rather than a survey-based estimate in the NFP series). In the past, benchmark revisions of the BLS series have pushed up the BLS series. [0] Today, Governor Walker again touted the QCEW numbers. [1] However, it appears that there will be only a small revision to the BLS series once they are benchmarked to the QCEW.

Technical Notes: I downloaded the QCEW private employment series, logged it, and seasonally adjusted using ARIMA X-12 (arithmetic), over the available sample (2001M01-2013M03). I regressed the log private WI nonfarm payroll employment series on this seasonally adjusted QCEW series to obtain the 2013M01-M03 fitted values. I then took the anti-log of the predicted series to obtain the estimates in levels. For the extrapolated values, I added the actual log changes in the BLS series and added to the fitted value for 2013M03 (in levels).

In sum: Wisconsin private employment growth continues to lag the Nation’s, as well as Minnesota’s, since 2011M01, despite any revisions likely to come from the newly release QCEW. [2]

“What on earth is the basis for making this claim?”
Basis? what are you talking about. We make these things up as we go. The sheeple that vote for us prefer a simple lie to a complicated truth. So we just promise whatever will get us elected and then blame our opponents when those promises do not come through. If something good happens its because of us – something bad its because of that other tribe.

I think the graph would better match the text if it also included the US and MN lines. Anyway, I like this series of posts, and I think Walker’s WI policies makes a pretty good test case for austerity. Hard to argue that these policies have helped WI, but also maybe not as bad as some suggested.

“Citing the way states in close proximity to each other have spun off in starkly different policy directions, Walker compared GOP-controlled Virginia to Democratic-controlled Maryland, and GOP-controlled Wisconsin to Democratic-controlled Minnesota and Illinois.
Walker says, “People in a year or two will get a pretty clear comparison” between the vastly different governance in Minnesota and Wisconsin, two states with otherwise similar political makeups and cultures.”http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/news/218243481.html